Julia Nechaieva, FTMBA ‘18 - From Ukraine to Russia to Berkeley, Dealing with First-Year Anxiety of Not Knowing Who You Are, and Haas Culture Preservation

Episode #16: Today we speak with Julia Nechaieva FTMBA ’18 who graduated this summer and will be headed to Google for Product Management. We start off with her background from Ukraine and the beginnings of her career at Innova, the top gaming company in Russia, and then to Yandex, the Google of Russia, before deciding to make the move to Berkeley. We discuss what it was like growing up in what the outside world classifies as the “Russian-side” of Ukraine so that we can learn more about what it was like for her growing up in a post-soviet European country. Additionally, we talk about how the Haas Culture Preservation project has helped shape her views on the Defining Leadership Principles, and provide us with some insights on their research thus far on how students can embrace the Haas culture differently, at different points in time, and how to deal with the anxiety of not knowing who you are or your place during your MBA at Haas.